CULTURAL WHIPLASH

Description of Cultural Whiplash: The Unforeseen Consequences of America’s Crusade Against Racial Discrimination

Racism in America has been called the elephant in the room that no one wants to recognize. Even though some have recently called for a national conversation on race, as if it were a subject never discussed or even acknowledged, in 2003 alone 776 books and almost 8,000 newspaper articles were printed on the subject.

During the civil rights era, racial discrimination was easy to spot in laws that made it difficult for minorities to vote or get decent jobs, enforced segregated schools, and denied minority students admission to many universities. Today, however, the racial climate is much different. Now we talk about “subtle” or “subconscious” racism, the sort of which the racist is unaware, that cannot be detected by the unassisted eye.

In this context, law professor Patrick Garry believes today’s racial problem is not silence, but rather confusion. Accusations of racism are vague but pervasive. They have become an indictment against the very legitimacy of society as a whole. With that has come a suffocating social guilt, and that sense of guilt has resulted in a steady retreat from moral and value judgments on all cultural matters, not just those of race. The fear of being branded as a racist has become so intense among whites that—even in the wake of the 9/11 attacks—the nation is immobilized from doing anything to slow the tide of illegal aliens flooding through its borders for fear of being excoriated as racist. The situation is not helped by those groups and ideologies that employ charges of racism as a weapon in a larger political crusade that transcends race.

Garry addresses racism in America from the perspective of the cultural majority, unlike most books on the subject that focus on issues that are important to the victims of racism. Garry instead examines how whites have allowed themselves to be marginalized in the conversation on race, how the fear of being labeled as racists has resulted in whites withdrawing from any dialogue or moral judgment involving almost all cultural matters, and how racial fear and guilt are influencing the moral health of America.

Reviews of Cultural Whiplash

“Even the most compelling political principle, when overextended and pressed into partisan service, will inflict grave social costs. This clear-headed, courageous book illuminates the underestimated danger.”
-Michael Greve, American Enterprise Institute

“An excellent, courageous, and incisive book. It is a call to arms for those seeking to restore racial harmony in America, and to return to the noble, founding principles of the 1960s civil rights movement.”
-Jeffrey T. Kuhner, Editor, Insight on the News, and Columnist, Washington Times

“Garry unearths and then scrutinizes just about every truth on the subject of race that most people fear to voice. He describes the gradual growth of a society where harboring an incorrect attitude toward race trumps all other sins and warns of the consequences to our general welfare when the antisocial behavior of certain minorities is condoned, thereby sending the worst possible signals to future generations.”
-Elizabeth Wright, Editor, Issues & Views

“Professor Garry shows how a new elite has converted Americans’ decent concern about racism into a political sledgehammer. Cultural Whiplash carefully documents how this elite uses claims of ‘racism’ to divert attention from their own corruption, to bully opponents, and to excuse the inexcusable. The book outlines their unspoken agenda—to remake America into a bitter and factionalized society over which they will preside!”
-Robert G. Natelson, Professor of Law, University of Montana

“A much-needed analysis of one of our most serious domestic problems: the effects of unfounded accusations of racism. Incredibly enough, these accusations and the fear they induce have become in many ways more harmful, especially to blacks, than racism itself. One of its effects is to divert attention from and make it extremely difficult to discuss real problems of minority groups and their possible solutions.”
-Lino A. Graglia, A. Dalton Cross Professor of Law, University of Texas School of Law

“An unusually copious litany of exactly how we’ve often made a confused mess, moral and otherwise, of what was once … understood as ‘civil rights.’ …The resulting ripples of these failures routinely gain, rather than ebb, in debilitating and divisive strength, as they extend throughout an often seat-squirming and, therefore, tongue-tied culture.”
-Mitchell B. Pearlstein, Ph.D, Founder and President, Center of the American Experiment

“Patrick Garry takes us through the way the politics of race has contributed to the corruption of our culture, how it is caught up in the culture of moral relativism, actually contributes to the perpetuation of race consciousness and racism in the culture and how all of us are worse off by retaining such shackles and presumptions. … Interesting and thought provoking read.”
-Craig Matteson, Hall of Fame Reviewer at Amazon Reviews

“I often think that if only the truth is spoken, then people will hear it. It will be so obviously recognized and people will go then to solve some of the problems that those truths have revealed. … There really is a lot of truth out there, … and this book is an example. Cultural Whiplash—a brief, powerful book by a professor of law, Patrick Garry.”
-Dennis Prager, Townhall.com

“No book better explains this cultural phenomenon [of racial politics] than South Dakota law professor Patrick Garry’s latest effort, Cultural Whiplash: The Unforeseen Consequences of America’s Crusade Against Racial Discrimination. Garry’s style is direct, forthright, and incisive while his exegesis is both skillfully rendered, in-depth, and thorough.”
-Bob Cheeks, Intellectual Conservative

“Patrick Garry does an excellent job discussing racism in today’s society. He has an objective attitude and opinion. He expresses it in an uncomplicated and straightforward manner. … I highly recommend Cultural Whiplash to everyone.”
-Debra Gaynor, Reader Views

“A strongly recommended, serious-minded account that does not downplay the evils of racism, but rather sheds light upon all the other societal evils in need of immediate attention that have been severely neglected in favor of tunnel vision upon the evil of racism.”
-Midwest Book Review

-Reviewed in Reference & Research Book News 2007

“Cultural Whiplash”-what an expressive title!-is a wonderful contribution to national well-being.  Evaluating scores of  incidents that the shoot-from-the-hip crowd ascribe to racial malignancy,  Professor  Garry shows that all too many of them have benign explanations that fit the facts better.  Would that we all learned from Garry to discipline our thinking before poisoning inter-group relations.
-Prof. Dan Subotnik – Professor of Law, Touro Law Center; author of Toxic Diversity: Race,  Gender, and Law Talk in America (N.Y.U. Press)